Survey: Technology is Helping Employees Perform Better

Today, Avanade, a global business technology solutions and managed services provider, revealed findings from a recent survey that involved approximately 600 C-level executives and IT decision makers spread throughout 19 countries.

One of the most interesting facts to take away from this just compiled research is that technology leveraged in the business environment is enabling operations to be much more streamlined, and is yielding several advantageous effects in regard to companies’ bottom lines.

Are you shocked by this news? Not really, I’m sure; after all, technological innovations are completely reshaping nearly every intricate detail of our daily lives so why wouldn’t the same apply to activities occurring within the enterprise?

Benoit Bertrand, Avanade Canada CTO and vice president, said in a statement, "Mobile and consumer technologies are becoming predominant in the workplace and are driving the transformation of how work and business is done. Business and IT executives are not only embracing these technologies, they're enabling them and achieving measurable results including increased employee morale, enabling new product development and driving profitability."

Below are some other key findings:

54 percent of Canadian companies (61 percent globally) stated that most of their workforce are taking advantage of the BYOD trend

46 percent of Canadian companies (54 percent globally) report the majority of their employees use smartphones for vital tasks like reading e-mails, documents and calendar invitations.

31 percent of Canadian companies (33 percent globally) utilize their tablets predominantly for work activities

Additionally, the data shows that companies remaining at the edge of innovation are prompting other organizations to take the plunge into the deep technology pool. Those forward-thinking, game-changing firms are now being referred to as "Work Redesigned” by Avanade.

While nearly 71 percent of respondents throughout the world have changed at least one business process lately in order to implement advantageous strategies such as BYOD and unified communications, only 20 percent have changed four or more business processes to become more mobile. So while it seems that businesses today are willing to make changes in order to see positive results ranging from a higher profit margin and increased flexibility to an overall much higher level of satisfaction, they are taking small baby-like steps as opposed to leaps and bounds.

Looking at the small business space particularly, “New technologies or systems can be intimidating for the small business owner. But don't let these feelings stand in the way of learning new processes that can help your business,” Andrew Goldman for Gaebler Ventures stated in a blog post.

He goes on to say that SMBs should ensure they remain up to date on all newly enhanced and introduced systems, and comments that if “cash is preventing you from obtaining a new system or technology, it's time for some financial homework. Calculate the return on investment for the new system and see if it would be worth the investment. If it's something that will help your business, obtaining a loan or other source of financing may be a prudent move.”